21 September 2012
Newtonmore - Aviemore - Invemess
Miles: 52.59
Feet up : 2202
Feet down : 3287
We are in Inverness
We are pooped and happy, and planning the last three or four days iof the trip.
Today was not our favourite biking day. We started out positively, in good weather, if a little nippy, thinking that, because we knew we would drop a thousand feet to sea level in Inverness, it would mostly be downhill
How wrong can you be.
The weather forecast was also very positive, and again, today was a lesson on not believing everything you read. It steadily deteriorated, because the sun never really got ahead. By the end if the day, we were battling wind and freezing cold heavy showers.
The land we biked over was beautiful, starting out with heather on the moors, then farmland, then through a pass, eventually coming down to the Firth of Moray, and Inverness at the top
The NCN route # 7 was mostly brilliant, except for some sign posting glitches , when I was again really grateful for JST's map reading abilities aided by his Garmin.
Inverness is a lovely city in the River Ness, which runs right through it. One can immediately sense a buzz in its life, and then I read where it is one of the fastest growing cities in Europe .
We found a hotel right on the river, with a great view of the castle. We did our usual settling-in routine of beer and shandy, got sorted in our room, and then had a wonderful Italian dinner at a little restaurant next door.
My bike rack completely lost its screws as we came into town, but my wonderful mechanic JST came to the rescue , and mixed and matched screws from our extra bottle holder mounts, and voila, problem solved. So far this is our worst mechanical problem.
At some of the hotels we come across a lot of bus groups. This morning as we were leaving, one of the buses was loading up also. One guy came and watched us setting up, asked us where we were going, how long, etc, and then asked JST how old he is, then asked how old " the missus" is. He was totally stunned - he confessed to being 70!!!!! As we rode off we could hear him regaling anyone who would listen with details of the wonder of if all.
Posted with Blogsy
No comments:
Post a Comment